Chapter 34: Did You Put Mushrooms in This Meal? (Please Follow)

"Minato, do you smell something?" Kushina, who was about to cook, suddenly caught an extremely enticing aroma.

"I do, a very tempting fried fragrance." Minato nodded.

"Right, such a tempting smell. How is it made?" Kushina sniffed the scent in the air, unable to suppress her curiosity.

She also cooked and had made fried foods like tempura, but never had she produced such an enticing aroma—just from the smell she could imagine the perfect golden, crispy appearance of the food.

"No, I have to go check it out." Kushina said and walked outside.

She sniffed carefully and found the source was the house to the right of Minato's.

"Hey, isn't this Hanyu's house? Minato, come out quick." Kushina waved to Minato inside.

If she remembered correctly, this was the home of the ninja academy teacher Hanyu Muyue.

Though she had only known him a few days, Muyue had left a fairly deep impression on Kushina.

Like Minato, he had blond hair and blue eyes, was eloquent, and had strong teaching skills.

Minato came out, looked where Kushina pointed, and nodded. "Yeah, it's Hanyu's house."

"Let's go visit the neighbor." Kushina pulled Minato and knocked on Muyue's door.

Muyue put the shrimp he had grabbed into a bowl, set down his chopsticks, walked to the door, and opened the wooden door.

As soon as the door opened, Kushina couldn't wait to ask:

"Hanyu, are you making dinner?"

"Sorry for disturbing you." Minato looked apologetically at Muyue, who still had his apron on.

"It's fine, I've just finished cooking and was about to eat. You two came just in time." Muyue said with a warm smile, then invited them inside.

Following the scent, Kushina walked straight to the dining table and saw the lightly golden tempura on the plate. Her eyes lit up immediately—this was the smell.

But once inside Muyue's home, Kushina noticed there was also the aroma of fried rice.

"Muyue, you're a hidden master chef. I could smell that tempura from next door!" Kushina praised.

"Hardly a master chef. I often eat alone, so I've gotten used to cooking." Muyue said as he took two cups from the cabinet and poured a glass of water for Minato and Kushina each.

"Feel free to try some—I just made it all." Muyue brought out two sets of utensils.

"Is that okay? You haven't eaten yet, have you?" Kushina stared at the tempura.

She really wanted to taste just how good that fragrant tempura was.

"I'm starting now." Muyue smiled, picked up a piece of tempura from the bowl, and put it in his mouth.

"Thank you for having us, Hanyu." Minato expressed his thanks.

"I dig in!" Kushina pressed her palms together ceremoniously, then picked up her chopsticks, lifted a steaming piece of tempura, and put it into her mouth.

"Mmm!" The moment she bit through the crispy outer layer, the soft, juicy, and tender shrimp inside made Kushina's eyes go wide.

Then something even more amazing happened: for a brief moment, Kushina felt as though she had been transported into the ocean, surrounded by a mysterious and magnificent blue world, and she was a carefree fish swimming happily all day.

"Huh?" Kushina snapped back quickly, almost thinking she had just been caught in a genjutsu.

But upon reflection, there was no one present who could put her under a genjutsu.

"Muyue, how did you make this tempura? You didn't add some weird mushroom, did you?" Kushina asked suspiciously.

She had heard of a ninja who picked mushrooms in the forest in summer, ate them, and ended up in Konoha Hospital still saying there were too many leaves on him and asking if someone could trim them.

"Uh, no. I just… did this and that…" Muyue briefly described his cooking process.

Just then, Kushina noticed that Minato had barely spoken after taking a bite of the fried rice. She looked at him and saw he was staring blankly, so she tapped him.

"Minato, what's wrong?" Kushina asked.

Minato replied subconsciously, "I was eating wild vegetables."

"What wild vegetables are here?" Kushina looked at the fried rice—aside from egg, there was only chopped green onion, no mushrooms. She asked in confusion.

"After eating that fried rice, I suddenly felt like I had turned into a wild pheasant living in the mountains…" Minato explained.

Kushina looked at the fried rice on the plate—each grain was plump and golden, seeming to emit a faint golden glow.

Because she was paying attention to the tempura, Kushina noticed that the fried rice seemed to be glowing!

"This is the best fried rice I've ever eaten," Minato said, unable to help scooping two spoonfuls into his mouth.

"Is it really that good? You should try the tempura," Kushina said doubtfully.

Then Kushina ate the egg fried rice, and Minato ate the tempura.

The expressions of shock and happiness once again appeared on both their faces.

"Hanyu, did you develop a ninja technique to make food delicious? This is way too good!" Kushina joked.

"If you ever think of opening a restaurant, please be sure to tell me," Minato said seriously.

He wasn't a person who valued material enjoyment, but Muyue's fried rice and tempura gave him an experience he had never had before.

"If you like it, feel free to come over more often. It's just that my place is rather quiet," Muyue invited with a smile.

"If you don't mind the trouble, then later we can also let you taste Minato's and my cooking, though it won't be as good as yours." Hearing Muyue's invitation, Kushina was a bit excited.

"Then I'll be looking forward to it," Muyue replied with a smile.

After seeing them off, Muyue thought to himself, the new skill really was powerful; it quickly advanced to mutual meal visits.

Muyue brought down some books from the bedroom on the second floor, gradually showing his interests.

Encouraged by Muyue and with Asuma as a friend leading by example, Obito was full of motivation. By Saturday, he would soon complete the chakra control training and start training in nature transformation.

By the weekend, Muyue, the tutor, was back to work.

"You liar!" Asuma yelled at Muyue.

Last week, in order not to waste the expensive tutoring fee, he really trained desperately and came home exhausted.

The harder and more painful the training was, the more Asuma hated Muyue after learning the truth.

"Oh, what did I lie to you about?" Muyue asked with a smile.

"Your tutoring fee is actually two thousand ryo per hour, and you lied to me saying it was twenty-five thousand ryo!" Seeing Muyue not admit it, Asuma got even angrier.

"Then did you lose anything? Did you really give me twenty-five thousand ryo?" Muyue continued asking.

"Of course, I..." Asuma wanted to say something, but suddenly realized he hadn't lost anything either.

"See, you didn't lose anything; you even made a profit. You thought you spent two hundred thousand ryo, but actually only spent sixteen thousand ryo, making a profit of one hundred eighty-four thousand ryo. You should thank me," Muyue said quickly.

"I made a profit?" Asuma thought along Muyue's line of reasoning, and it did seem like he had made a profit.

"Then it's fine. Let's start training," Muyue said leisurely.

"No, something's wrong, very wrong," Asuma felt something was off.

Transition chapter